Just like ol’ times — NZ Herald tells us what we’re interested in

Wednesday’s article “How to get RICH — 10 steps to becoming a millionaire” (written by a freelance writer whose net worth isn’t stated) is sooo reminiscent of the boom days and the breathlessness of the pursuit of money. And we can see how that worked out.

Question: Do you think the media (a) leads or (b) reflects what we’re interested in?

6 Comments »

The public may yearn for a diet of mindless reality TV shows, celebrity gossip shows, and stulifying soap operas. More property porn, anyone? What about another cooking show?

An alternative could be to mandate that the media deliver more worthy output as well?

For example, the 1970’s ground-breaking documentaries “Civilisation”, “The Ascent of Man” or “The World at War” were quality BBC productions that did not necessarily cater to the lowest common denominator’s tastes. They were no worse for this oversight. To the contrary, society may benefit from the media sometimes not serving up what the public thinks that they want?

Perhaps the media should be encouraged (or coerced even?) to lift their game in regards to the educational quality of their programmes and productions, even at the expense of some profitability?

Poormastery is not sure, but suspects that it is an issue that is worthy of further rumination by policy makers.

Another way of looking at the BBC and other ‘quality’ broadcasters (as opposed to ‘commercial’ ones — which can also, obviously, produce wonderful work too!) is that a pool of funding is set up with the goal of producing top-notch, ambitious projects. If you create a honey pot, and apply some standards to the potential projects you will fund, the creatives will come.

On the subject of media agendas, I found this, from a Newsweek article about the influential boss of Fox News, illustrative:

The left has long branded Fox a propaganda arm for Ailes’s pugnacious conservatism, and while his journalists maintain they play it straight, the network has certainly provided ample fodder for liberal detractors. But as President Obama’s popularity has plummeted and the country has grown increasingly sick of partisan sniping, something unexpected happened. Roger Ailes pulled back a bit on the throttle.

He calls it a “course correction,” quietly adopted at Fox over the last year. Glenn Beck’s inflammatory rhetoric—his ranting about Obama being a racist—“became a bit of a branding issue for us” before the hot-button host left in July, Ailes says. So too did Sarah Palin’s being widely promoted as the GOP’s potential savior—in large measure through her lucrative platform at Fox. Privately, Fox executives say the entire network took a hard right turn after Obama’s election, but, as the Tea Party’s popularity fades, is edging back toward the mainstream.

While Fox reporters ply their trade under Ailes’s much-mocked “fair and balanced” banner, the opinion arm of the operation has been told to lower the temperature. After the Gabrielle Giffords shooting triggered a debate about feverish rhetoric, Ailes ordered his troops to tone things down. It was, in his view, a chance to boost profits by grabbing a more moderate audience.

Disclaimer – poormastery states that anything I say that in any way resembles the crap these guys speak is entirely coincidental. I may have been drunk or high at the time…

Obviously, poormastery has stated his views before regarding Fox News- which is that although they have an agenda, the US media is of ample size to have appropriate counter-weights. Furthermore, the US media is dominated by liberals. Fox arguably balances this show?

Don’t get me wrong. Poormastery doesn’t necessarily like all the intransient fanaticism. Yet intransience is what the founding fathers set up in the US, on purpose, with some justification. MMP can be the same. Despite much crazy talk, you eventually end up in the middle ground, one way or the other?

Also, note that the legendary US “liberals” could be considered to be little better that the so-called Fox “conservatives” – you know Mr Clinton (the degenerate slopjar) wasn^t exactly seated on the high moral ground. And no – poormastery is not merely referring to Clinton’s rather tedious penchant for getting into “personal relationship” difficulties. Solopsism issues. Check out Hitchens…

“Imposing an agenda is very tricky.”

Agreed. Of course, the diversion to US politics and Fox News is arguably a long way from this debate?

I agree the conversation has wandered, but that’s cool. I like your suggested conclusion:

Despite much crazy talk, you eventually end up in the middle ground, one way or the other?

Yes. Pushed towards the middle ground with flashes of ideology like asset sales on one side or expansion of welfare/workers’ rights on the other.

On the media agenda…

My own experience of working in the NZ media leads me to the conclusion which I’ve expressed before that it’s very rare to stumble across an explicit partisan agenda here — although not unheard of.

Generally those working in news (myself included) aim to diligently uphold the big O Objective journalism and be truthful and fair … but taken as a whole, *the media* often displays a, let’s call it ‘tendency’ to side with the establishment. Talkback show hosts are generally pretty right wing (chicken or egg? dunno)

Might in some ways the UK, or Murdoch papers/media in the US with their party loyalties worn on their sleeves be easier to deal with?

Here’s a brilliant article by the brilliant Paul Krugman in yesterday’s NY Times on ‘post-truth politics’… let me know what you think …

Why does Mr. Romney think he can get away with this kind of thing? Well, he has already gotten away with a series of equally fraudulent attacks. In fact, he has based pretty much his whole campaign around a strategy of attacking Mr. Obama for doing things that the president hasn’t done and believing things he doesn’t believe.

For example, in October Mr. Romney pledged that as president, “I will reverse President Obama’s massive defense cuts.” That line presumably plays well with Republican audiences, but what is he talking about? The defense budget has continued to grow steadily since Mr. Obama took office.

Then there’s Mr. Romney’s frequent suggestion that the president has gone around the world “apologizing for America.” This is a popular theme on the right — but the so-called Obama apology tour is a complete fabrication, assembled by taking quotes out of context.

As Greg Sargent of The Washington Post has pointed out, there’s a common theme to these whoppers and a number of other things Mr. Romney has said: the strategy is clearly to portray the president as a suspect character, someone who doesn’t share American values. And since Mr. Obama has done and said nothing to justify this portrait, Mr. Romney just invents stuff to make his case.

But won’t there be some blowback? Won’t Mr. Romney pay a price for running a campaign based entirely on falsehoods? He obviously thinks not, and I’m afraid he may be right.

I don’t know what the point of Mr Romney is. He flip-flops around so much on policy; I get the feeling that there is nothing there, except the desire to hold office. I hope he fails to achieve this.

As for the “utterly fraudulent campaign” regarding Mr Obama, he does have the reputation in the media for being anti-business. CNBC runs this line consistently. Mr Obama’s rhetoric around the banking crisis may have been justified, but he was naive if he didn’t expect some blowback for that. Perhaps the Obama is anti-business line is an effective opposing position to take, because there might be a kernel of truth in the claim? Personally, I don’t think Mr Obama has done much to help the economy or business, but Mr Romney’s rhetoric exaggerates the truth to silly proportions.

Is this just right wing bullying a one way process – a conspiracy, of sorts? Poormastery notes that the smears tend to go both ways. Articles from the 1980’s not written by Ron Paul are constantly dredged up, to make him appear racist. I don’t it. He is a libertarian. His comment that no country besides the US required a Civil War to end slavery is contorted to somehow being a support for the continuation of slavery…

Personally, I am not convinced that Mr Obama deserves to get re-elected. His achievements are few – a health care plan (that doesn’t look long term sustainable), and pulling the troops out of Iraq (finally). For sure, he was dealt a poor starting hand. And yet – he won on a platform of (if he wanted to, radical) change. What a disappointment. There have been so many missed opportunities…

To comment on your points in turn:

“Pushed towards the middle ground with flashes of ideology like asset sales on one side or expansion of welfare/workers’ rights on the other.”

Hmmm. Governments have sold utilities such as telecommunications and other utilities across the entire Western world. Virtually no developed country still holds these assets in public hands. Left and right wing governments across the whole of Europe introduced this policy as far back as the 1980’s. I do not think of these asset sales as a particularly radical ideology… Welfare / workers rights are, however, issues that are very split on ideological lines.

“Generally those working in news (myself included) aim to diligently uphold the big O Objective journalism and be truthful and fair … but taken as a whole, *the media* often displays a, let’s call it ‘tendency’ to side with the establishment.”

NZ is much smaller, so the British / US media system, where the entire spectrum of views is catered for in different media outlets is not really feasible. The power of State TV in NZ does not help…

Alas, to me at least, the general neutrality of the news media in NZ (I agree with you on this point) makes for an extremely bland serving of commentary and news.

“Might in some ways the UK, or Murdoch papers/media in the US with their party loyalties worn on their sleeves be easier to deal with?”

The US / British media certainly generate a more interesting product, in my view. People don’t generally just want dry facts. They want analysis. What does it all mean?

“Talkback show hosts are generally pretty right wing (chicken or egg? dunno)”

Pam Corkery was on the radio when I was in NZ (this was your show, no?).

I always thought she was an ignoramus, but she almost singlehandedly gave NZ MMP, with her ferocious and incessant lobbying for this system (taxpayer paid?). Her Parliamentary career ended in something approaching ignominy?

As for Mr Krugman, you will probably be unsurprised to read that I am generally underwhelmed by his musings. His solution to every problem seems to be for the government to spend more money. Not quite “brilliant”, in my book.